Category: Video Games

Games Workshop has brought missing-in-action Warhammer 40,000 animation Astartes 2 back from the dead with an incredible teaser trailer that has wowed fans of the hobby. However, there’s a catch: nothing in the teaser will be in the new animation.

Astartes 2 is Games Workshop’s follow-up to the fan-made original Astartes animation, created by Syama Pedersen. It is widely accepted as the greatest Warhammer 40,000 animation ever made, official or unofficial, only perhaps bettered by Amazon’s recently released and excellent Space Marine 2 animation for the Secret Level anthology series.

Indeed, Astartes was so good that it inspired Saber Interactive’s hugely successful Space Marine 2, and Games Workshop eventually brought Syama in-house to work on the sequel.

But fans hadn’t heard a peep out of Games Workshop on Astartes 2 for years, leading some to wonder whether the company had quietly cancelled it. Fast forward to today, January 29, and the surprise reveal of the teaser trailer, which is a feast for Warhammer 40,000 fans.

It’s not even February yet and the Ws for 2025 won’t stop coming! Astartes is back, Brothers! pic.twitter.com/sYhu5LjwiC

— Champions of the Ice (@ChampionsOTIce2) January 29, 2025

The teaser suggests an animation on a scale never-before-seen from Warhammer 40,000 at this quality level, with melee combat, shooting, vehicle combat, and even spaceship battles all showcased. We see a number of different Space Marine chapters in battle across varied environments, and multiple enemy races, including Tyranids, Orks, and Tau.

It certainly hypes up Astartes 2, but it turns out nothing in the teaser will be in the animation itself when it finally launches in 2026 exclusively on Games Workshop’s subscription-only Warhammer+ streamer. According to a post on the Warhammer Community website:

“This teaser trailer is not actually clips from the new animation, instead showing a compilation of shots that represent the former lives of the characters that will appear in the show. There’s a pretty unsubtle hint at the end as to the nature of the final story… We’ll leave you to speculate and start putting the pieces together yourselves.”

So, while the teaser is certainly cool, that’s all it really is for now. We still haven’t seen anything of Astartes 2, and the lack of a disclaimer on the trailer probably won’t do it any favors in the long term. A fan who catches this teaser would reasonably expect what it shows to appear in Astartes 2; most won’t see the Warhammer Community post.

Still, it’s hard not to get excited as a fan and speculate about what it all means. It looks like the characters in the trailer end up in an Inquisition-led Deathwatch Terminator squad, based on the final image. But that’s about all I’ve managed to glean from it so far.

Meanwhile, I’ve already seen Space Marine 2 fans look jealously upon the Astartes 2 teaser and hope for some or all of it to make its way across to the game. Capes are an early shout. Saber is continuing to update the game, so perhaps it’s time for the developers to take some inspiration from Astartes once again.

Image credit: Games Workshop.

Wesley is the UK News Editor for IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.

Pokémon Trading Card Game Pocket has received its long awaited trading update today and, despite players slamming the mechanic upon developer Creatures Inc. revealing how it would work last week, it’s somehow launched to an even worse reception.

Players have taken to social media to share their frustration at the trading feature, criticizing it for having too many requirements and too many restrictions. While the latter were revealed upon trading’s announcement last week, the former was veiled under the statement “items must be consumed in order to trade.”

Unlike the Wonder Pick feature or opening booster packs, every instance of trading will require two separate, new use of items. The first is similar to those other mechanics, where in order to trade players must have Trade Stamina. This recovers over time or can be exchanged for Poké Gold, meaning real world money.

Trade Tokens

The other item is what’s causing a stir amongst the Pokémon TCG Pocket community, however. Trade Tokens are also required for trading any card at 3 Diamonds or higher. 120 Trade Tokens are required to trade a 3 Diamond card, 400 are required to trade a 1 Star card, and 500 are required to trade a 4 Diamond card, meaning an ex Pokémon.

Trade Tokens can only be obtained by essentially selling cards. Players can delete from their collection a 3 Diamond card for 25 Trade Tokens, a 1 Star card for 100, a 4 Diamond card for 125, a 2 Star card for 300, a 3 Star immersive card for 300, and a Crown gold card for 1500. Cards of lower rarities are worthless, though require no Trade Tokens to trade either.

This means players must sell, for example, five ex Pokémon before they can trade one ex Pokémon, or five 1 Star card (the rarest available to trade) before they can trade one 1 Star card. What’s more, selling one Crown rarity card, which are the rarest in the game and may not be obtained even after months of playing, will only net players enough tokens to trade three ex Pokémon.

Selling one of the next rarity, the 3 Star immersive art cards used a selling point for Pokémon TCG Pocket itself, doesn’t grant enough Trade Tokens to trade either a 1 Star card or a 4 Diamond card.

‘A Monumental Failure’

“The trading update is an insult,” wrote hurtbowler on Reddit in a post with over 1,000 upvotes, a player who vowed not to spend another penny on the game. “It’s just frustrating. The greed is just so excessive I can’t be inclined to spend another dollar. They should probably remove ‘Trading Card Game’ from the title screen. It’s just insulting to look at.”

“It’s silly to have to burn two immersive cards to be able to trade just one 4 Diamond ex,” said someone in the comments. “I understand they want to keep people from creating bots and exploiting the system, but this is currently absurd.”

Others called it “hilariously toxic” and “monumental failure,” and lamented that a “safe way for the community to connect more” was sacrificed for something “so laborious.” Exchanging something for Trade Tokens also takes around 15 seconds, meaning many will have to spend minutes in menus before they can trade a single card.

“If these are the trade costs, the app should be renamed to Pokémon Card Game Pocket wrote Darkmalice in the comments of a post discussing the high costs. “I don’t think they want people trading at all,” said another user. “That’s why they made it so bad.”

Pay Day

Fans have complained trading is fairly clearly being implemented as a means of increasing revenue for Pokémon TCG Pocket, which is estimated to have made $200 million in its first month, before trading was possible.

This is also evidenced by the inability to trade cards of 2 Star rarity or higher, as if players could immediately trade for their missing cards, they wouldn’t need to spend $10 or $100 or more for a random chance of getting them. It cost one player around $1,500 just to complete the first set, for example, and the third in three months will be available tomorrow.

“The trading system is predatory and downright greedy,” wrote ACNL on Reddit, who outlined the Trade Token conversion rates. “That’s just messed up man. Like who designed this? If there were other ways to get tokens, this might be passable, but at the moment there are no other ways to get tokens.

“This isn’t sustainable at all. On top of that, you can’t even burn a card unless you have three copies of it. If you want to trade in this game, you better buy a ton of packs and keep buying them.”

Creatures Inc. Stays Quiet

Creatures Inc. has not yet commented on the backlash to trading. Doing so is a rare move for the developer but it did so for the initial complaints when trading was revealed last week. “Your concerns are seen,” it said at the time. “Once this feature becomes available, I’d like to invite everyone to try it and provide feedback. This way, the game can continue to evolve in an enjoyable way for everyone.”

This response made it sound as though things may be better than fans expected, but that is certainly not the case. IGN as asked Creatures Inc. for comment on this reaction and if any changes are planned.

As mentioned by some users, the trading mechanic could be rectified somewhat by Pokémon TCG Pocket including Trade Tokens as rewards for missions and such. It’s more likely Trade Stamina will feature in these though, as it has so far included adjacent items like Wonder Stamina and Pack Hourglasses as rewards.

Regardless, the introduction of such a poorly received mechanic today is a bad look for a game about to debut its next big update, which will introduce Diamond and Pearl Pokémon such as Dialga and Palkia to the digital card game.

Ryan Dinsdale is an IGN freelance reporter. He’ll talk about The Witcher all day.

Konami has hailed the success of the Silent Hill 2 remake after it shot through the 2 million sales mark.

Silent Hill 2 remake, developed by Bloober Team, went on sale on PlayStation 5 and PC via Steam on October 8, 2024 (there’s no word on an Xbox Series X and S version yet), and just a few days later had sold one million copies. This was thought to have made Silent Hill 2 remake the fastest-selling Silent Hill game ever, but Konami has yet to rubber stamp that potential record.

“Since its release, Silent Hill 2 has received a multitude of accolades including several ‘perfect’ review scores, multiple award wins and nominations cementing itself as a timeless entry in the horror video game genre,” Konami said.

IGN’s Silent Hill 2 remake review returned an 8/10. We said: “Silent Hill 2 is a great way to visit – or revisit – one of the most dread-inducing destinations in the history of survival horror.”

The sales success of the Silent Hill 2 remake will perhaps embolden Konami’s plans for the franchise, which have ramped up significantly in recent years. Silent Hill f and Silent Hill: Townfall are both still in the works, but perhaps Konami will also continue to remake past Silent Hill games. There’s a film adaptation of Silent Hill 2 coming, too.

Modders are doing eye-catching things with the Silent Hill 2 remake on PC, too, including removing hair sheen, the game’s famous fog, and even turning it into Sunny Hills.

The Silent Hill 2 remake features several new puzzles and redesigned maps, so if you need help navigating through it all, head to our Silent Hill 2 Walkthrough Hub. We’ve also got a comprehensive guide to the Silent Hill 2 Remake endings, all Key Locations in the game, and what changes in New Game+.

Wesley is the UK News Editor for IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.

Dino Crisis and Dino Crisis 2 are back from the dead with re-releases on PC via GOG.

Both cult classic PlayStation survival horror games are available on the CD Projekt-owned platform DRM-free, with their original content fully intact as part of GOG’s Preservation Program.

Capcom released Dino Crisis on the original PlayStation in 1999 and then Dino Crisis 2 just a year later. Dino Crisis 3 launched as an original Xbox exclusive in 2003 and fans have yet to see a new game since.

Despite the occasional groundswell of opinion that Dino Crisis should return with a brand new entry in the series or a HD remake, Capcom seems uninterested. Indeed Capcom’s 2022 announcement of Exoprimal, a multiplayer-focused action game featuring dinosaurs, was seen as the final nail in the coffin for Dino Crisis. And in August last year, Dino Crisis creator Shinji Mikami said the popularity of Capcom’s Monster Hunter doesn’t leave room for a reboot or remake of the beloved PlayStation game.

The PC ports of the first two Dino Crisis games were difficult to find and tricky to get up and running on modern machines, so GOG’s work here is welcome.

“Thanks to the tremendous efforts of Capcom and GOG, Regina’s iconic line, ‘You’re extinct!’ no longer applies to the game itself,” GOG said of Dino Crisis. “The timeless thriller that defined a generation of gamers is made to last forever, enhanced for today’s systems, featuring all the original content you loved with numerous improvements.”

Dino Crisis PC: what to expect with GOG’s version of the game:

• Full compatibility with Windows 10 and Windows 11
• All 6 localizations of the game included (English, German, French, Italian, Spanish, and Japanese)
• Original, Arrange, and Operation Wipe Out modes included
• Improved DirectX game renderer
• New rendering options (Windowed Mode, Vertical Synchronization Control, Gamma Correction, Integer Scaling, Anti-Aliasing, and more)
• Increased rendering resolution to ~4K (1920p) and color depth to 32-bit.
• Improved geometry calculation, more stable transformation and texturing.
• Improved alpha transparency
• Improved game registry settings
• Issue-free animation, video, and music playback
• Issue-free saving (the game no longer corrupts save files after leaving dropped weapons)
• Full support for modern controllers (Sony DualSense, Sony DualShock4, Microsoft Xbox Series, Microsoft Xbox One, Microsoft Xbox 360, Nintendo Switch, Logitech F series and many more) with optimal button binding regardless of the hardware, hotplugging and wireless mode

Dino Crisis 2 PC: what to expect with GOG’s version of the game:

• Full compatibility with Windows 10 and Windows 11
• All 2 localizations of the game included (English, Japanese)
• Easy difficulty, Dino Colosseum and Dino Duel included
• Improved DirectX game renderer
• New rendering options (Windowed Mode, Vertical Synchronization Control, Gamma Correction, Integer Scaling, Anti-Aliasing and more)
• Improved music playback and volume scaling
• Improved item rendering and fogging
• Improved cartridge boxes alignment
• Issue-free video playback, task switching and game exit
• Full support for modern controllers (Sony DualSense, Sony DualShock4, Microsoft Xbox Series, Microsoft Xbox One, Microsoft Xbox 360, Nintendo Switch, Logitech F series and many more) with optimal button binding regardless of the hardware and wireless mode

Meanwhile, GOG announced its Dreamlist, a community-based tool anyone can use to vote for the games they want to see revived or added to the platform. These votes help GOG show community interest to IP owners and bring these games to life on the platform, it said.

Wesley is the UK News Editor for IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.